Know yourself. It’s an adage that is core to us conscious beings.
The process of getting to know yourself is not an easy one. You have to dig deep and really think hard about why you are. Not what or how you are, but why. This is a hard question to which only you can formulate an honest answer. Once you start to get a feel for what the answer is, it makes your life and the decisions you have to make so much easier. Feel is core in the previous sentence, you can’t just make it up or rationalize it. There’s no faking or shortcuts here. You have to dig deep and feel the why. If you don’t feel it yet, keep digging.
And yes, if you dig deep enough you’ll hit the existential questions. Once you’re there, good.(try to ask why five times about basic things you do, and it will get existential real quick) You’ve hit the boundaries of self. Retrace your steps and explore a different route. Don’t get stuck in the existential part, it will bring you down.
It’s easy to just keep busy with whatever surrounds you and go with the motions (the default) of society and never really think about these things. This is a limited life. Your conscious brain is the most advanced tool evolution has ever produced. Not exploring it’s capabilities is like getting handed a modern day supercomputer and only using the calculator function. For your computer to do great things, you need to understand it’s operating software and source code.
Some people are afraid to ask themselves these questions. What are they afraid of? Discovering themselves? Discovering who they truly are and what drives them? Finding fulfillment? Realizing they are just doing what others expect them to do and being able take matters in their own hands? It sure as hell sounds a whole lot better knowing why you do things and being excited about them every morning when you wake up.
Once you did the work, the digging and thinking, you will have easy access to that part of your brain for when you need to revisit it when life challenges you.
Sit down, do the pondering, know yourself.